She slid into one of my kitchen chairs, pulled out a cigarette, and lit up without asking permission. “Is that any way to talk to me?” she said.

I sighed, pulled two mugs down from the cabinet above the sink. I wasn’t in the mood for her games, her back-and-forth. I’d had to endure it as a child, but I was a grown-up now. “What do you want, Mama?”

“Surprised you’re up this early.” She took a long drag on her cigarette, and smoke billowed from her nostrils. “Seeing as how you had a late-night visitor.”

I froze in the act of pulling milk out of the fridge, kept my head turned away where she couldn’t see my face. “What are you talking about?”

I didn’t have to see her to hear the smirk in her voice. “That Izzy Logan’s daddy. Walked out of here like he was half drunk. And not on alcohol.” She gave a guttural laugh. “Let me guess, he was looking for a certain kind of comfort.” She let her voice linger on the word, making it sound dirty and disgusting. And to most of the world that’s what it would be. A married man and his baby mama, hooking up in her crappy apartment while his grieving wife sat at home alone. But there was so much more to the story. It had never been about the sex. It had been about Junie. And this morning Zach was back where he belonged.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” I muttered. When I poured coffee into my mug, it slopped over, scalding my fingers. “Ow, shit.” I flapped my hand. “What were you doing here last night anyway?” Hoping to deflect her attention, already knowing it was a losing battle. When she latched on to something, sensed a weakness, she was worse than a dog with a bone.

“Came to see you. But changed my mind when I saw Logan doing the walk of shame.” She got up and wet a paper towel in the sink, held out her hand for mine and wrapped my fingers in the cool cloth. I used my free hand to point at the oval scar on the back of my hand, below the edge of the paper towel. “Remember that?” I asked her.

She nodded. “Yep. You had it coming.” No remorse, no give. I’d been seven and whining for dinner, not shutting up even when she’d warned me. Cal must not have been home; otherwise he would have stopped me, pulled me away before things went bad. But he hadn’t been there, and Mama’d grabbed the white-hot spoon she’d been using to melt meth and held it to the back of my hand. It was the one constant of my childhood. A refrain as familiar as my own name. You had it coming. Four easy words that excused every variation of sin. Thanks to Louise, I knew more about my mama’s past now, but it didn’t do a single thing to change our present. Even if I wanted a different relationship between us, even if I tried, she never would, because she saw absolutely nothing wrong with everything that had come before.